West Virginia ANG C-130H-3

[swp53]

Hi,
First I am not in the military and this question is just out of interest from an aviation enthusiast, so no I don't need to know.

While looking at photo's on airliners.net some but not all of the WV ANG Herks have something I have not seen on other Herk photo's. My initial thought was some form of formation marking/light.
These are horizontal black and white stripes for want of a better discription on the front and rear fuselage and a vertical one on the tail and are on both sides of the aircraft.

This link shows what I am on about.

Photos: Lockheed Martin C-130H Hercules (L-382) Aircraft Pictures | Airliners.net (http://www.airliners.net/photo/USA---Air/Lockheed-Martin-C-130H/1591753/L/)

Regards,
Steve

[Doobry Firkin]

You answered your own question....... Formation lights!:ok:

[Green Flash]

And not just on Alberts either. I've seen them on a variety of cabs, Harriers spring to mind and I think Tonkas too.

[StopStart]

Yup, jolly splendid things - electro-luminescent formation lights are fitted to pretty much every US aircraft type. We in the UK, as always, know much better than everyone else so had them removed from our C130Js. Another genius move :rolleyes:

[swp53]

Hi Guys,
Thanks for that, the ones on FJ's seemed to be a pale green in colour so with these appearing to be white/black had me wondering if it was something else other than formation lights. I just thought it was strange that they did not appear to be fitted on all the WV ANG aircraft that appeared in the pics, I presume that its to a particular spec standard of the basic model C-130H.
Thanks again,
Steve

[GreenKnight121]

It will depend in whether that particular airframe has received the mod or not.

I first saw them on A-6Es in the mid-1980s. My squadron got some aircraft back from depot-level maintenance in 1986, and they had those strips instead of the normal bulb-style lights. By the time I left the USMC in the middle of 1989, only about half of our aircraft had them.

If those WVNG Herky-birds haven't been back to a maintenance depot for a number of years (a decade or more... very possible for low "hours-per-year" aircraft), they won't have gotten them installed.

[Sook]

Yup, jolly splendid things - electro-luminescent formation lights are fitted to pretty much every US aircraft type. We in the UK, as always, know much better than everyone else so had them removed from our C130Js. Another genius move :rolleyes:


For formation lights to be of use we'd have to have more than one aircraft serviceable and co-located at once! ;) What chance of that after Midday?

[Ex Douglas Driver]

The light-green portion is the electroluminescent portion for visible night formation ops (overt, doesn't produce enough IR energy to interfere with NVGs);
and the black portion produces infrared for NVG or covert ops.

Astronics LSI | Products | Exterior Lights | Formation Lighting (http://www.dmecorp.com/LSI/products/formation.asp#dual-mode)

I found the best way to tell that you'd turned up the wrong light switch was when the wingman yelped for the formation lights to be turned on during the join!

[Art Field]

StopStart. I remember recommending, to no avail, electro-luminescent lighting for the Tristar tanker back in the early 80's. Indeed it would have been ideal for all the tankers. I wonder if the 330 will have it, I still have a small piece somewhere I can let them have if I can find it.

[devonianflyer]

The RAF has them on the C-17.

Seen here (http://www.airliners.net/photo/UK---Air/Boeing-C-17A-Globemaster/1669498/M/) on the tail, fuselage and wing tips.

DF

[NutLoose]

And the chinook has them on the roof, so did the Phantom etc